There are about 1,600 botanic gardens in the world. They grow tens of thousands of plant species between them; probably as much as a quarter of all the world's flowering plants and ferns are in their collections. The increasing rate of the loss of plant diversity and wild habitats worldwide has encouraged many botanic gardens to become important conservation centres.
In many countries, botanic gardens are amongst the leading, and sometimes the only, institutions involved in or capable of undertaking extensive work in wild plant research and conservation. Many new botanic gardens are being opened or developed to act as centres for plant conservation, study and education, particularly of plants native to their own regions.
Botanic gardens can be defined as public gardens which maintain collections of live plants mainly for study; for scientific research, conservation or education. Many different types of botanic gardens occur, large and small. While their size and resources varies hugely, botanic gardens are united in the belief of the important role that they must play in preserving the world's plant diversity.
- Botanical gardens grow large collections of endangered plants, holding them safely in cultivation or seed banks in case wild populations are destroyed.
- They reintroduce plants back to wild as part of species recovery projects.
- They undertake botanical research to document and record the plants of the world and their characteristics. For example, their collections of dried plants (herbaria) contain millions of specimens as a permanent global reference on plant diversity.
- They promote environmental awareness amongst the general public through their education work. Globally, botanic gardens receive more that 150 million visitors each year.
- They are expert centres for horticulture and training; knowing how to grow a plant may be a key to its future survival.
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